Met Council Joins Minn. Lawsuit Against 3M

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — The Metropolitan Council is joining the state of Minnesota in its lawsuit against 3M Co. seeking damages for alleged environmental consequences tied to its disposal of chemicals once used to make Scotchgard.

Met Council officials say Monday that the agency faces spending millions of dollars to meet new state regulations for discharging perfluorinated chemicals from wastewater treatment plants into the Mississippi River. The Met Council says 3M is responsible for those new regulations because of its one-time practice of discharging such chemicals into the environment.

Met Council manager Bill Moore says the new requirement could cost its wastewater ratepayers in the Twin Cities roughly $1 billion over a 20-year period.

3M’s general counsel says PFCs have not been shown to harm humans at the levels present in the environment.